‘Slayed’ instead of paid
A UCLA law student moonlighting as a drug courier for a bicoastal cocaine ring was murdered on a Midtown street because a buyer didn’t want to pay him for a prior shipment, prosecutors said Tuesday.
“This is a case about a California-to-New York . . . drug-trafficking conspiracy that broke bad,” Assistant District Attorney Jon Veiga told jurors at the seconddegree murder trial in Manhattan Supreme Court.
Brandon Woodard, 31, was assassinated on Dec. 10, 2012, on West 58th Street as he headed to collect $161,000 from buyer Lloyd McKenzie, 39, according to prosecutors. He had already shipped McKenzie five kilos of cocaine on consignment a month earlier.
“Rather than pay him for the cocaine, he had a bullet fired through Brandon Woodard’s skull,” Veiga said.
McKenzie’s lawyer argued the prosecution’s motive for the murder makes no sense.